The Race for Governor & Attorney General
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THE RACE FO R GOVE R NO R & ATT O R NEY GENE R AL: C AMPAI G N ROUND T ABLE 2006 • THE RACE FOR GOVERNOR A joint program of Milano and the Center for New York City Affairs at The New School. & ATTORNEY GENERAL 72 FIFTH AVENUE Campaign Roundtable 2006 NEW YORK, NY 10011 WWW.MILANO.NEWSCHOOL.EDU Wednesday, November 29, 2006 THE RACE FOR GOVERNOR AND AttORNEY GENERAL: CAMPAIGN ROUNDTABLE 2006 was made possible thanks to the generous support of Bernard L. Schwartz and the Dyson Foundation Milano also wishes to thanks the following for their help in planning and coordinating this event: Mark Halperin of ABC News; Mia Lipsit and Andrew White of the Center for New York City Affairs; Louis Dorff, Tracy Jackson, and Vandana Nagaraj of Milano; Daniel Morris and Caroline Oyama of The New School; and Gigi Georges, Molly Watkins, and Howard Wolfson of the Glover Park Group. This publication is available on the Web at: www.newschool.edu/milano/docs/The_Race_for_Governor.pdf For further information or to obtain copies of this report, please contact: Center for New York City Affairs Milano The New School for Management and Urban Policy 72 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10011 212.229.5418, fax 212.229.5335 [email protected] www.newschool.edu/milano/nycaffairs www.milano.newschool.edu Edited Transcript Edited by Sarah Tobias Photographs: Don Pollard IFC THE RACE FOR GOVERNOR AND AttORNEY GENERAL: Campaign Roundtable 2006 Wednesday, November 29, 2006 THE RACE FOR GOVERNOR AND AttORNEY GENERAL: CAMPAIGN ROUNDTABLE 2006 TABLE OF CONTENts Dean’s Forward . .v Roundtable Program . vii EDITED TRANSCRIPT • SEssION I: THE RACE FOR AttORNEY GENERAL Who’s Who . 1 Campaign Timeline . 2 The Democratic Primary: Could the Result Have Been Different? . 3 Framing the Frontrunner: Cuomo, HUD, and Tobacco . 5 Engaging the Frontrunner: Politics Without Personal Attacks . 9 Building a Campaign: Lessons from the Past . 12 Republican Expectations: Limited Party Support . 14 Chauffeur-Gate: The Hevesi Issue . 15 Republican Strategy . .16 Aiding, Abetting, or Absent: Mario Cuomo and Al Pirro . 17 The Ascent of the New York State Democratic Party . 20 The O’Donnell Factor . .21 Press Strategy . 22 Engaging Ethnic and Specialty Media . 23 Using Gubernatorial Clout . 24 Pirro and the Chewing Gum Incident . 24 Green, Maloney, Pirro: The Political Future . 24 EDITED TRANSCRIPT • SEssION II: THE RACE FOR GOVERNOR Who’s Who . 26 The Republican Primary: Could the Result Have Been Different? . 26 Campaign Timeline . 27 The Future of the Republican Party in New York State . 27 Weld’s Campaign: Running as Incumbent . 29 The Democratic Primary . .35 Explaining Suozzi’s Candidacy . 37 Derailing Spitzer: A Possibility? . 39 The General Election . 43 More Chauffeur-Gate: Faso for Comptroller? . .45 Lights, Camera, Action: Faso Freezes . 46 The Same-Sex Marriage Question . 48 Rudy Giuliani and the Nomination Fight . 48 Spitzer and the Press . 49 Chauffeur-Gate: The Finale . .49 Advertising Strategy . .51 Strengthening the Democratic Party . 51 Lightning Round Questions . 52 Schumer vs. Clinton . 52 Participant Biographies . 54 FOREWORD Shortly after the 2006 election, Milano The New School for Management and Urban Policy invited senior strategists from the campaigns for New York attorney general and governor and the journalists who covered them to discuss the races. The forum followed a similar discussion convened by Milano after the 2005 New York City mayoral campaign. The focus was on how campaign decisions reacted to events, how decisions were made, and why. In addition, our intention was to leave a historical record of elections in our city and state enabling us to turn back to them in the future, compare strategies over the years, and learn from the differences and similarities. The race for governor was vastly different from the mayor’s race. While Mayor Bloomberg, like Eliot Spitzer, ultimately won his election with a substantial majority of the vote, he did not start out with a substantial lead in the polls. The 2005 election year also featured a competitive, and at times, nasty Democratic primary. Not so in 2006. Eliot Spitzer was a juggernaut from the moment he quietly announced he was running for governor a full two years before the election. He had established a national reputation as attorney general for taking on Wall Street and many observers thought that his “Mr. Clean” image was just what the state capital—notorious for secrecy and dysfunction—needed. Despite a spirited challenge in the primary by Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi, Spitzer’s path to the nomination and the Governor’s Mansion seemed largely unobstructed. He was able to run as both an agent of change and as an incumbent. Additionally, it was noted that New York’s senior senator, Charles E. Schumer, had at one time expressed interest in running for Governor but decided early on that he would remain in the U.S. Senate. This, too, had a profound effect on the Democratic field. After Governor Pataki’s announcement that he would not run for a fourth term, jockeying for the Republican nomination began immediately, with early attention focusing on former Massachusetts Governor William Weld. Originally from Long Island, Weld had returned to New York after serving nearly two terms as an extremely popular moderate Republican in the Bay State. Weld—a Harvard educated, charismatic lawyer who reporters appreciated for his wit and unguarded comments—stood in stark contrast to the serious, precise, and lawyerly bearing of Eliot Spitzer. As we learned in our discussion, Weld’s lack of understanding of how primaries work in New York led to his being outmaneuvered by the lesser-known John Faso. Faso assiduously courted the county chairs and ended up with the nomination. He has since returned to the private sector. A number of the observers in the room expressed the view that we have probably not heard the last of Bill Weld, since he would certainly like the v option of running for Hillary Clinton’s senate seat Andrew Cuomo remained quiet, largely refusing to should it become vacant after the 2008 election. engage on the topic. Pirro confronted the allegations head on and demanded an investigation into the source Despite stark differences in their campaign platforms, of the information that had been leaked to the press. the contest between Spitzer and Faso didn’t generate Ultimately, she didn’t lose much ground in the polls, many sparks. The election was portrayed in the press but the distraction prevented her from closing the large from the beginning as Spitzer’s to lose, and Faso had gap that stood between her and the first-born son of a hard time breaking through that inevitability. Faso’s former Governor Mario M. Cuomo. serious style and message almost exclusively focused on taxes, and left him little opportunity to highlight the What follows is a transcript of the two roundtable differences between himself and Spitzer. For example, conversations (edited lightly for comprehension). We on social issues such as same-sex marriage, Spitzer hope that you find the dialogue as informative, useful, and Faso parted ways. John Faso did not believe it an and thought-provoking as those of us around the table important issue though clearly it would have scored and in the room did. him some points. At the roundtable, there was criticism of the way the press covered this race. By continually —DeanFredP.Hochberg referring to John Faso as trailing by 50 percentage MilanoTheNewSchoolforManagement points, it made it very difficult for the challenger to andUrbanPolicy ever gain any momentum. We hope this is one of the lessons learned from our review of the campaign. Because of the lack of competitiveness in the governor’s race, we decided to add to our review an office that doesn’t normally attract much attention, but in 2006, it was the one to watch. Jeanine Pirro, the former Westchester County District Attorney, was the only candidate for the Republican nomination. She switched to the attorney general’s race after some initial stumbles in her attempt to take on Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. Pirro was popular with Republicans statewide—she was moderate on social issues, telegenic and articulate, and her tough- on-crime rhetoric appealed to suburban voters. But she also had baggage in the form of a convicted felon husband. His past and present mistakes came back to haunt her again and again on the campaign trail. The Democratic primary featured two well-known candidates—former New York City Public Advocate Mark Green and former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Andrew Cuomo. The race also featured Charlie King, a longtime Democratic Party activist who had worked under Andrew Cuomo at HUD, and a first-time candidate, Sean Patrick Maloney—an openly gay lawyer who had also served in the Clinton administration. Cuomo led in the polls in the period leading up to the primary and general elections. But there was a sense among reporters covering the race that his fortunes could change, and that if he ended up with the party’s nomination he would face a spirited challenge from Pirro. Pirro did indeed run an aggressive campaign but she was severely hobbled by the announcement of a federal investigation alleging that she had illegally attempted to wiretap her husband in order to uncover whether he was having an extramarital affair. Pirro’s private life served as fodder for the tabloids for days, while vi PrOgrAM 8:00–8:30 a.m. Continentalbreakfast 8:30–8:40 a.m. Welcome,DeanFredP.Hochberg 8:40–10:15 a.m. RoundtableI:TheRaceforAttorneyGeneral 10:15–10:45 a.m. Break 10:45 a.m. to 12:45 p.m.